


bitter + sick

by bygoneboy



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Developing Relationship, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fuckbuddies, M/M, References to Depression, Twisted and Fluffy Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-22
Updated: 2016-05-22
Packaged: 2018-06-10 03:04:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6936940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bygoneboy/pseuds/bygoneboy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Their trysts are straight-forward, mutually beneficial. The lines are always clear and neither of them have ever attempted to cross them; Hux never stays over any longer than he needs to. The only time he slipped up—</p><p>(He had fallen asleep in Ren’s bed. It was an accident. He had woken up with Ren’s big arms around him, Ren’s eyes watching him, dark and velvet-soft; Ren had stood barefoot in the low-lit kitchen with the ugly yellow wallpaper and made him coffee, strong, no sugar, a little cream. Hux wasn’t sure how Ren knew the way he took it. He didn’t ask.)</p><p>It hasn’t happened since.</p>
            </blockquote>





	bitter + sick

The windshield wipers beat a steady drum against the dashboard pane, snow flying past in thick clumps as Hux turns off the highway and onto the narrow wet backstreets. His phone chimes in his back pocket— the _wshhh_ of a lightsaber swing. It’s a text tone that Ren insisted he reserve for him. _So you’ll know when it’s me._

 

Hux hadn’t argued and he’d told him it was because this way, he’d know exactly which texts to ignore. Not that he’s ever actually ignored Ren’s texts— something he’ll never confess to— since, in his own defense, it’s difficult to, when he knows where most of their loaded altercations will lead. 

 

And admittedly— his self-control is poor, where it concerns Ren. 

 

That’s something else he’ll never confess.

 

He huffs when his phone goes off again, not taking his eyes off of the road. He can imagine what the text says. One of Ren’s tasteless, heavy-handed attempts to warm him up before he’s even gotten inside. Something like— _need u here,_ typed out lazy,  _thinking abt ur cock. wanna fuck u hard._

 

Fucking— shameless. He’s always been shameless.

 

Before they’d met, Hux had never thought he was the kind of guy to go for this kind of thing. Their trysts are straight-forward, mutually beneficial. The lines are always clear and neither of them have ever attempted to cross them; Hux never stays over any longer than he needs to. The only time he slipped up—

 

(He had fallen asleep in Ren’s bed. It was an accident. He had woken up with Ren’s big arms around him, Ren’s eyes watching him, dark and velvet-soft; Ren had stood barefoot in the low-lit kitchen with the ugly yellow wallpaper and made him coffee, strong, no sugar, a little cream. Hux wasn’t sure how Ren knew the way he took it. He didn’t ask.)

 

It hasn’t happened since.

 

The text tone sounds again— _twice—_ and a flush creeps up his collar. Ren is trying to get him killed, he thinks, no way he’s taking his hands off the wheel in this weather. But he’s already squirming in his seat, an ache in his hips, thinking about what else Ren wants to do, wants to do to _him_. Hold him down, maybe. Blindfold him. Suck him off that way, three fingers in him until he’s begging.

 

The minute he turns onto Ren’s street he’s struggling to get his phone out of his pocket, palms sweating, that weird, manic thrumming he gets in his blood, when Ren’s around. He parks, clumsily, a few doors down from his apartment, and frees his phone, unlocking it in one smooth swipe.

 

_(6 NEW MESSAGES)_

 

_From: Kylo_

 

_00:05— r u coming_

 

_00:12— r u here yet_

 

_00:16— pls ok_

 

_00:20— hux?_

 

_00:20— pls hurry_

 

_00:28— please. please._

 

Hux’s blood runs as cold as slick ice on pavement.

 

 _I just parked,_ he texts back, fast, kicking his way through the knee-high un-shoveled snow of the sidewalk. _I’m going to come up, is your door unlocked?_

 

He waits fifteen seconds, thirty, his heart hammering in his chest. No answer. He squeezes through the front entrance, goes past the broken elevator and starts up the five flights of stairs, staring down at the screen of his phone, that tiny little word— _please._ It’s beginning to burn behind his eyes. _Please._

 

If something’s happened—

 

Ren lives in a bad part of the city—

 

Nothing’s happened, right, but—

 

_Please._

 

“Ren!” he shouts, pounding on his door, he doesn’t care that it’s past midnight, the neighbors can deal with it, they’ve heard worse from Ren’s apartment, anyway, “Open the door! Kylo,” Something catches in his throat. “Kylo, Jesus Christ—”

 

The door swings open, and Hux is face-to-face with—

 

With Ren’s bare chest. His ratty socks, stained sweatpants. Eyelids, crusted red, eyes, oddly empty. Unwashed hair tangled and cow-licked.

 

“What— are you— are you _drunk?”_

 

“What?” Ren says, hoarsely. “No.”

 

“Fuck,” says Hux, angry, incredulous, suddenly. He wants to shove at Ren’s stupid toned chest. Chuck his phone at Ren’s head. “You can’t just— you fucking idiot. I was—” 

 

_Worried._

 

It sticks in his throat. He knows Ren hears it, all the same.

 

“Oh,” says Ren. “Sorry.”

 

The apartment is a wreck. Hux pushes past him to see the damage— the den floor, littered with an curious assortment of junk. The kitchen sink, nearly unrecognizable under the mountain of dishes weighing it down. There’s fruit rotting on the counter. Something crunches under the heel of Hux’s snow boot as he peers down the hallway, toward Ren’s room. He doesn’t even need to open the door. The smell is bad enough with it closed.

 

“What the fuck,” says Hux, turning on his heel, jabbing his finger at Ren, who’s still sulking in the doorway. “I’m not letting you fuck me in this.”

 

“I don’t want to fuck you,” mumbles Ren.

 

Hux stares at him. “Excuse me?”

 

“I didn’t—” He rubs the back of his neck, deep eyes unfocused, staring off at nothing. “I didn’t ask you over so I could fuck you.”

 

“What? You think I’m helping you _clean?”_

 

“No,” says Ren, voice thin, frustrated. “That’s not— never mind. You can go.”

 

Hux balls his hands into fists. “Look, I did not drive forty-five minutes in a snowstorm for _this_.”

 

“I changed my mind,” Ren mutters, words going strangely thick, slouching against the wall. “Fuck off.”

 

“Fine,” Hux says, waspishly. “But you owe me gas money, at least.”

 

“Dresser in my room. Top drawer. Sorry to waste your time.”

 

Hux almost doesn’t notice, caught up in grabbing for Ren’s bedroom door handle, in thinking about the hellish drive he’ll have to slug through to get home again. But Ren’s voice wobbles on his apology and by the time he manages to correct it it’s too late. Hux has heard.

 

He turns back around.

 

Ren has the knuckles of one hand pressed over his mouth. His other hand is swiping desperately at his eyes.

 

“Oh, my god,” Hux says, and stares. “Are you— crying?”

 

“No,” says Ren, his voice cracking, and if he wasn’t crying before, he is now. “Fuck you.”

 

“Ren.” Hux’s voice pitches up in disbelief, his stomach reeling, dropping.  

 

“I didn’t have anyone else to call,” Ren says, words still muffled behind his hand.

 

“What happened?”

 

“Nothing,” says Ren. “This, I get like this. It’s just me.”

 

“It’s fucked _up,_ Ren—"

 

“I thought you knew.” Ren looks at him and perhaps it’s supposed to be mocking, but it comes out questioning, and pained. He says— “I thought you. Knew me.”

 

“I do,” Hux says, fiercely.

 

Ren drops his hands, reaches for him. “I just—”

 

“I know,” Hux says, foolishly, and grabs his face in both hands, and pulls him down.

 

And he does, he thinks, kissing him hard, feeling the sounds he makes vibrating in his chest, he does know him, even if there are— things, that he doesn’t understand, things that Ren doesn’t want him to understand. Why the name on Ren’s mailbox spells out _Ben Solo._ Why Ren had refused to answer his mother’s phone-calls until after Hux had left the room. The reason he’d avoided Hux’s eyes, after he’d hung up. He had taken Hux’s cock in his mouth to stop him from asking questions, and it had been such an obviously evasive move, but Hux—

 

Hux had just let him.

 

“Okay,” says Hux, breathing against Ren’s lips, feeling Ren’s tears hot on his own cheeks. “Okay.”

 

They’ll stand there in the hallway for another minute or so, he decides. And Ren will stop his ugly crying. And then Hux will wrap two blankets around Ren’s shoulders, and pull one of Ren’s grimy sweatshirts over his own head, and they’ll go up to the apartment roof, where it’s stopped snowing, and sit huddled together in a space they’ve cleared, big enough for two.

 

The tips of their noses will turn to ice but they’ll stay out there for what feels like forever, the city just a white mountain-scape in the distance. Hux will light up a cigarette, and then maybe he’ll let Ren kiss him again, past his bad breath and cracked lips, and let him put his hands on his throat, and press his tongue to Hux’s teeth, and their breath will fog the space between them. And after the cold sun comes up Ren will stand barefoot in his cluttered, messy, yellow-papered kitchen, and make him coffee, the way he likes it. And then, after all that. 

 

Then they’ll deal with the clutter. 

 


End file.
